In the study, vegetarians were more than 30% less likely to develop diverticular disease when compared to their counterparts who ate meat.

The study appears in an online edition of BMJ.

Researchers from the Cancer Epidemiology Unit at the University of Oxford in the U.K. compared the risk of developing diverticular disease among 47,033 adults, including 15,459 who were vegetarians.

After 11.6 years, 812 people developed diverticular disease, resulting in 806 hospital admissions and six deaths. Vegetarians were less likely than meat eaters to develop diverticular disease, the study showed. What’s more, people who had a diet rich in fiber (about 25 grams a day) had a lower risk of being admitted to the hospital and/or dying from diverticular disease, compared with people who ate less than 14 grams of fiber a day.

These findings lend support to public health recommendations that encourage the consumption of foods high in fiber, such as whole wheat breads, whole-grain cereals, fruits, and vegetables, conclude study authors led by Francesca Crowe, a nutritional epidemiologist at the University of Oxford.

In an accompanying editorial, David J. Humes and Joe West of Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust in Nottingham, U.K., write that about 71 meat eaters would have to become vegetarians to prevent one diagnosis of diverticular disease.

“Overall the opportunity for preventing the occurrence of diverticular disease and other conditions, such as colorectal cancer, probably lies in the modification of diet, at either a population or an individual level,” they write. Still, “far more evidence is needed before dietary recommendations can be made to the general public.”